KELLER'S TAKE KELLER: Why the finish to the Sting vs. Joe main event at Bound for Glory was utterly stupid Oct 13, 2008 - 12:36:19 AM

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By Wade Keller, Torch editor

The finish of Sunday night's TNA Bound for Glory PPV was ridiculous. It's an example - among the most glaring - of why TNA's booking team continue to stunt TNA's growth. This finish alone doesn't cause TNA great harm, but the fact that it's reflective of the IQ level of TNA's booking week after week means it is a symptom of the larger problem.

Let's cover the basics:

Kevin Nash obviously wanted to cost Samoa Joe the match and his title since he bashed him with a baseball bat, allowing Sting to win the TNA World Title.

That's fine. Well, it's interference at the end of the main event of your biggest annual PPV and there are plenty of arguments against doing that, but in a general sense, it makes sense within TNA's storylines that Nash might turn on Joe. We can actually anticipate his explaining his decision.

Here's what makes zero sense. Less than a minute earlier, Nash yanked the baseball bat away from Sting just as he was about to use it against Joe. Immediately afterward, Joe nearly defeated Sting because of Nash's interjecting himself from ringside. In fact, Nash had no way to know that an opportunity would present itself to interfere again, nor could he rule out that Joe wouldn't win immediately after he took the bat from Sting. So Nash, by his own actions, may have caused the opposite result he wanted.

Let's be clear. Nothing happened between the time Nash took the bat from Sting as he was about to hit Joe and a minute later when he hit Joe that would explain Nash having a change of heart. For instance, had Nash yanked the bat away from Sting, but Joe didn't see it happen, and then if Joe looked at Nash and, say, gave him the finger, that could explain Nash changing his motivation and wanting to cost Joe the match. That's one of many examples of how to explain a Nash change of heart. None was present here.

So Nash's opportunity to actually knock out Joe and cost him the title might not have happened. Nash could have ended the night helping Joe retain his title. Sting might not have kicked out as he did right after Nash yanked the belt from him. Or the match might have continued without an opportunity for Nash to hit Joe with the bat from ringside without the ref seeing it and calling for a DQ. It was only a very specific series of unforeseeable circumstances, out of Nash's hands, that led to his initial "swerve" (taking the bat from Sting) not causing the opposite of his desired outcome to occur.

So Nash's character is made to look either stupid or erratic.

Why was the finish played out this way? One reason. The bookers (Jeff Jarrett, Vince Russo, Dutch Mantell - and this is right out of Russo's playbook) wanted to "trick" fans for a few seconds into thinking Nash was on Joe's side before "swerving" them by having Nash hit Joe a minute later. You see, the rationale is that it's more shocking because Nash did the opposite seconds early. But it wasn't. It took a simple storyline (for which there are strong arguments against even if logically executed) and made it "too cute by half" to the point of distracting from its desired effect and making Nash look like stupid or erratic.

Ultimately, the fans they're playing to (the ones who thought Nash left the company because of a "merchandising dispute" - you know, the Internet fans) are well aware that bookers control the actions of wrestlers. They just want storylines to make sense. This one did not. So rather than serving their fans by "playing with their emotions in a surprising way" (my assumption is that was their goal here), they left fans thinking, "Boy that was stupid. It was bad enough they ended their top PPV's main event with outside interference, but the way they did it makes no sense."

Imagine a scene in a movie. A husband and wife who have had an up and down relationship are walking down the street. The husband has taken an insurance policy out on his wife. He's thought of killing her, but he's conflicted and also loves her. She has her back turned as a car, driven by someone under the influence, heads right toward her. He yanks her out of the way of the car and saves her life. Then, a minute later, without any possible knowledge of another car coming her way, another car actually careens toward her and this time he lets the car hit her and smiles with satisfaction as if his master plan was executed. It'd be terrible storytelling and the script would be laughed out of any production studio. The finish of Sting vs. Joe was worse.

I cannot fathom a rationale for the way it was booked that makes sense. I can't see any explanation other than the bookers came up with an idiotic way to get from point A to point B. They wouldn't be idiots on purpose. Which means they didn't see the idiocy of how they booked the finish. Which means they shouldn't have the job they have.

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